


Dangerous Spice

by LillianMontane



Category: One Piece
Genre: Allergies, Hurt/Comfort, Illnesses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-18
Updated: 2018-05-18
Packaged: 2019-05-08 10:08:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14691996
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LillianMontane/pseuds/LillianMontane
Summary: Sanji comes down with an illness that Chopper has difficulty curing.





	Dangerous Spice

 

“Sanji-kun? Are you ok in there?” Nami knocked on the closed door trying to get a response out of the chef who was behind it.

 

Sanji groaned to himself. Of course it would be Nami. A beautiful flower like her shouldn’t have to see him like this. “I am honored for your concern, my dear. Please don’t trouble yourself though on my account.”

 

“May I come in?” Nami knew that their chef would never admit he needed help, so she figured to judge for herself. She didn’t get a verbal response, but the lock clicked and the door cracked open. Slipping through the opening, Nami let out a slight gasp. Sanji looked absolutely miserable. He was sitting on the bathroom floor leaning against the wall, face pale and covered in a slight sheet of sweat.He offered her a weak smile in a pathetic attempt to assure her he was alright.

 

“Why haven’t you been to Chopper yet?” Sanji winced as her voice accentuated his already painful headache.

 

“There’s nothing he can do about this. I’ll be fine, Nami.” He sighed and closed his eyes, leaning his head back against the wall. Try as he might to convince her, it wasn’t lost on Nami that he had called her just her name without any silly honorifics attached; he really must be feeling bad.

 

“Well, is there anything I can do to help?”

 

Another slight smile. “No, thank you. Please could you just leave me alone? And close the door when you leave?”

 

“Of course. I’ll check on you again later. Shout if you need anything.” With that, Nami left the washroom and closed the door behind her. Immediately hearing painful retching again. She decided to go talk to Chopper.

 

Finding the small reindeer reading in the medical bay, Nami cleared her throat so he noticed her presence. “Hi Nami! What’s up?”

 

“Has Sanji been to see you recently?”

 

“Why do you ask?”

 

“I think he may need your expertise, Doctor. I found him locked in the washroom earlier...”

 

“He’s sick again?!? Why didn’t he come down here?” Chopper immediately left the medical bay in search of the blonde. He didn’t give any of the warnings Nami had, instead barging into the washroom to take care of his most recent patient.

 

Crossing the small room, he placed a comforting touch on Sanji’s back as the chef heaved over the toilet. As his convulsions ended, Sanji gave up and collapsed to the floor, throwing his arm over his eyes and groaning again. “Just let me die. I can’t handle much more of this.”

 

“Think you can make it down to the infirmary? I’d like you to get some sleep. And I need to keep an eye on you. Maybe give you an IV since you can’t keep any fluids down right now. Don’t worry, Sanji. We’ll figure this out.”

 

“If dying in a corner isn’t an option... just give me a minute to work up the strength.”

 

*****

 

Chopper watched Sanji sleep on the infirmary cot. He had hooked the chef up to the IV and given him some sedatives to encourage rest. It just didn’t make any sense. There was no fever, no sign of infection, no symptoms of virus, and they’d been on the ocean for nearly 2 weeks without making port. The small doctor felt horrible that he couldn’t figure out what was wrong to help his patient and friend. Chopper was starting to fear that the answer was something he wouldn’t be able to cure with his limited resources on the ship. He really hoped it wasn’t an autoimmune disorder or god forbid, a type of cancer. Shaking his head, he decided to go get some more reference books from the library and come back when Sanji woke up.

 

*****

 

Blinking and rubbing his eyes to clear his vision, Sanji looked around the medical bay. He felt much better. The headache had subsided to a dull throb, and the nausea was completely gone. He was surprised to realize he was in fact hungry. After more poking and prodding from Chopper he was released from the infirmary, allowed to function normally, but under orders to return and rest if he started feeling any relapses. After a week of no more episodes, Sanji and Chopper were feeling pretty confident that whatever the problem was had resolved itself and was now in the past.

 

*****

 

A month had passed from when Nami had found the blonde chef incapacitated on the washroom floor. Now Sanji was in his kitchen making dinner for the crew. He had decided on using the chicken they had gotten on the last island and roasting it with a sweet and smokey dry BBQ rub. Paired with some garlic-rosemary red potatoes, this would be a hit with everyone.

 

Halfway through the meal though, Sanji had to excuse himself and hurry quickly out of the galley. 

 

Fuck! Not again! I can’t go through this another time! Sanji tried to fight it, but his body betrayed him and he bent over the railing, violently ill into the ocean. Groaning, the blonde took himself into the medical bay and lay down, resigned to misery for the next few days.

 

*****

 

Chopper looked suddenly up from the book he was flipping through. “Sanji, do you have any allergies?”

 

Lying on the cot once more hooked to the IV, Sanji opened one eye and peered at the doctor. “No. Why?”

 

“Well, because your symptoms mimic food poisoning, but no one else got it. And I know that your cooking wouldn’t result in that anyway. But your body is responding as if you ingested something toxic. Can you remember what you made for the meal right before the last time this happened?”

 

He sighed. That was quite a way back to remember. “Yeah. Give me some time; I’m sure I can come up with it.”

 

*****

 

“Curried chicken with rice and potatoes. I’m sure.”

 

Chopper smiled at his friend. “Great! Now list off the ingredients for that. And then we will go through last nights meal. Maybe there will be something there!”

 

After listing all the ingredients in both dishes, they compared the lists. “Well we can mark off potatoes, chicken, salt and pepper. You’ve had that plenty without reactions. What’s cumin?”

 

“It’s a spice I picked up a few islands back. It adds a nice pizazz to pretty much anything.... Chopper, you’re brilliant! I had never used it nor eaten it before, that MUST be the problem!”

 

“That’s what it is looking like. But there is really only one way to find out for sure.”

 

“Don’t make me eat it plain.” Sanji stared at the doctor, knowing that’s exactly what he had planned.

 

“Would you rather not test it, and then find out later that wasn’t the problem and it’s actually something much worse? I don’t want you to do this right away though. Just in case it is something else, you have to be symptom free for 48 hours. Then we will test.”

 

Sanji closed his eyes and lay back on the cot. “I’m looking forward to it, doctor.” Chopper rolled his eyes at his patient and left the room.

 

*****

 

“Ok, are you ready?”

 

Sanji was back in the medical bay. He lay on the cot with a bucket on one side and a blanket on the other.Chopper had hooked Sanji up to the IV already, knowing that if this were the culprit, he would need it. Might as well make this miserable experience as easy as possible.

 

The chef nodded, took a deep breath, and chugged the glass of water that had cumin dissolved in it. “Ugh, the taste plain is nearly enough to make me gag.”

 

“Ok. We’ll know soon.” Chopper sat back in his chair as if he were watching an entertaining show.

 

*****

 

24 miserable hours later, they had their answer. Sanji was allergic to cumin. The first thing he did when Chopper released him from the medical bay was march directly to his kitchen, grab the container full of the poisonous spice, and throw it as far overboard as he could.

 

“Wow, Cook. Never thought I would see you deliberately wasting anything edible.”

 

“Shove off, algae head. It’s not edible. It tried to kill me.”

 

Zoro laughed at that. “Nearly taken down by a defenseless spice. That’s pretty pathetic.”

 

“Keep laughing, and I’ll make sure you go through what I had to go through these last few months!”

 

Nami watched the two as they got into another pointless fight, glad that their chef’s misery had been resolved.


End file.
